If a child comes to the Larson Justice Center in Indio, it’s usually because something has gone wrong for them or someone they know. And research shows that, for children who come to the courts and leave with a sentence, the first time tends not to be the last.

But Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin wants to prevent that by educating kids about the legal system and is bringing seventh and eighth graders directly to Riverside County courts to gain first-hand knowledge of how it operates.

Last week, prosecutors working within the District Attorney’s Crime Prevention Unit hosted students from Jefferson and Indio Middle Schools for a five-day Law and Leadership Academy intended to raise awareness about what happens within Riverside County’s criminal justice system.

Amy McKenzie, who does outreach for the District Attorney’s office, created the program in 2016 and has partnered with the Crime Prevention Unit Hestrin established in years since. The logic behind the outreach effort, McKenzie said, is that education and being a presence in the community can be effective at preventing crime.

“Community outreach and crime prevention go hand-in-hand. We feel the more transparent our office is to the community and the more we get our message out there helps deter crime,” McKenzie explained.

Over the course of a week, students participating in the Law and Leadership Academy learned about basic forensics and crime scene investigations from investigators. They met with judges and probation officers to learn about criminal proceedings. And, with the help of prosecutors from the District Attorney’s office, they played defense attorney, witnesses, and prosecutors in an extensive mock trial at the end of the week.

The District Attorney's office has hosted the academy three times in different parts of Riverside County and prosecutors Mike Tripp and Hawlee Valente have facilitated the academy in Indio. With inadequate education about the legal system, the prosecutors say, Riverside County youth often don’t understand how courts work and the kind of consequences placed on offenders.

“Everybody from our office was represented, from attorneys to investigations, to support staff to victim services to paralegals,” Tripp said.

When it was founded in 2016, Hestrin wanted it to focus primarily on forensics and the larger life cycle of criminal cases rather than take the approach of conventional juvenile awareness programs like “Scared Straight,” which educate youth deemed at-risk about life behind bars. The program is meant to be inspirational and each of the three Law and Leadership Academy sessions hosted in Riverside County brings a group students chosen by school counselors for their interest in law enforcement, not for prior disciplinary issues.

Rather than leave the program in fear of the court system, at the end of the week, a majority of the students were in joyful spirits. When Assistant District Attorney Michelle Paradise asked what students wanted to be when they grew up, a majority said they aspired to careers in the criminal justice system as forensic technicians or prosecutors.

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Students at Thomas Jefferson Middle School wait outside the gates for school to open on the first day in Indio, August 24, 2017. (Photo: Jay Calderon/The Desert Sun)

After learning about fingerprinting and ballistics, Felipe Andrade, an eighth-grader who lives in Indio and attends Jefferson Middle School, now wants to be a forensic investigator. In addition to learning more about a potential career path and meeting people working in law enforcement, Andrade said he thought it was important that kids understand the criminal justice system and called the academy’s college preparatory session a highlight.

“This is the age where you make decisions that really affect your life,” he said.

Alondra Barrios, another eighth-grader from Indio, gave a closing statement on behalf of the defense in the mock trial. She enjoyed learning about the legal system and interacting with prosecutors, she said, and believes more people should understand the legal system.

“When people come to court they need to know what’s going on and what lawyers do,” she explained.

Students and prosecutors with the District Attorney's Office in the Larson Justice Center courtroom where they held a mock trial as part of the District Attorney's Law and Leadership Academy, July 27, 2018.(Photo: Courtesy of Riverside County District Attorney's Office)

The District Attorney’s emphasis on crime prevention comes as the movement calling for criminal justice reform in California grows louder. Reform advocates decry high incarceration rates and advocate for alternative programs to keep people out of prison.

In Riverside County, the felony arrest rate for youth ages 10-17 was 271 per 100,000 when last reported in 2016. Of those arrested, roughly 30 percent are confined in state youth facilities and county juvenile halls, according to data collected by California Sentencing Institute’s Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice. In California, young people who spend time incarcerated are plagued by high recidivism rates. In 2017, the Department of Juvenile Justice found that 74 percent of youth arrested were rearrested within three years after being released from incarceration.

Defense Attorney Lara Gressley, who ran against Hestrin for Riverside County District Attorney in the June election, claimed too much emphasis was placed on pursuing harsh sentences within the department and called for an embrace of crime prevention and alternative sentencing initiatives.

“Kids don’t know what’s going to happen if they commit a crime, so we need to teach them in schools and bring them to court,” she said at a March Town Hall in Perris hosted by the ACLU in response to a question about juvenile arrest rates.

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Quickly after being sworn in to serve as the District Attorney in 2015, Michael Hestrin established the office's Crime Prevention Unit and attempted to "innovate" the work of the District Attorney's office. He is here photographed at Palm Desert Civic Center during a public event in April of 2018.(Photo: Omar Ornelas/ The Desert Sun)

Hestrin has implemented a series of grant-funded crime prevention initiatives directed toward youth to educate them on the court system, combat truancy and interdict them from joining gangs. Through programs like the Law and Leadership Youth Academy, Hestrin and the prosecutors working in his Crime Prevention Unit hope bringing District Attorney’s office employees out into the community and exposing youth to the criminal justice system will prevent later entanglements.

The objective of the academy, prosecutors Tripp and Valente said, extends beyond the students chosen to participate. They hope that the lessons trickle out and that the legal literacy kids glean from the academy will be passed along to friends and classmates as the students enter high school.

“Our hope is that they act as little ambassadors. Because not everyone gets to do this; there are adults who never get to see the inner-workings of the criminal justice system. They take this back to their school and back to their family and they get a completely different view,” Tripp said.